


Blunt Force Trauma

by whosDaredevil (EyeofOrion)



Category: Daredevil (TV)
Genre: Gen, Non-Graphic Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-19
Updated: 2016-04-19
Packaged: 2018-06-03 05:39:50
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 721
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6598927
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/EyeofOrion/pseuds/whosDaredevil
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Claire, as usual, is cleaning up the mess somebody else made.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Blunt Force Trauma

_Blunt force head trauma._

Claire was familiar with it. Like most life-threatening injuries often sustained in vicious fights, Claire was far _too_ familiar with it. She was a nurse; seeing a lot of things that nobody really wants to see came with the territory.

But this one came with a new, singular dull ache in the back of her own skull. Every time people were scraped off a pavement in droves and carted in with recognisably similar injuries, the casualties Claire saw inched towards a more uniform pattern. And a pattern indicated a common denominator.

The thing was, there was never any let-up. The new, fist-heavy common denominator didn’t make the stream of injured people, mixed up with the wrong gang or maybe just in the wrong damn city, any less. Maybe it was preferable to have this new scourge, so at least the people Claire saw “deserved” to be there a little more than others who could have been. But there was a danger there, and Claire knew it.

Who “deserves” and who doesn’t is a subjective thing, and a vigilante believes that it isn’t. He takes it into his own hands, because he believes he deserves to make that choice. That he has a _right_. But the choice is a power, and anyone believing they have a right to power over other people is dangerous.

Every time Claire heard mention of “our mutual friend”, it tugged at her. Even the euphemistic nicknames were uncomfortable. A name is good enough for the rest of us; what does it say about a man if he accepts an alias implying heroism? Or implying something else?

 _Blunt force trauma_ was medical speak, and Claire knew what it translated to in legal speak. Every sorry pawn that got dragged in with fist-shaped bruises at his temples or an indentation from a pipe to the back of the head was _grievous bodily harm_. That was, if they left breathing. The difference between _grievous bodily harm_ and _manslaughter_ – and even that was the kinder of the M words used for one human killed by another – was a thin line. That thin line was another thing Claire saw too often: green on black, and accompanied by a piercing high-pitched _beep_ that had got stuck on the _ee_ and would never reach the _p_. A horribly unfinished wail; a line that even a blind man could recognise. _Flatline_.

Yes. Some of them died. Believe it or not, if you hit enough people very hard in the head and leave them bleeding in alleys or on rooftops, some of them die. Whatever good intentions pave your road, the human body can only take so much, and then, however much they “deserve” or don’t, they die. Some of them died.

She heard her own voice in her head sometimes, like a memory from the future rather than the past. The inevitable moment when, one day, she or somebody else would have to tell her “mutual friend”, the common denominator, the cause and effect of blunt force head trauma.

_They’re dead, Matt. You killed them._

Maybe it was wrong that she hadn’t told him already. But communicating with Matt was difficult. He had his morals, all painted out in black and white. No grey; no context; no subjectivity; only the beliefs he held and the strength of conviction to carry them out, blow after blow after blow. “Only God can judge,” he would say, hand tracing a cross over his scarred chest, as he took on the role of judge, jury, and corporal punisher himself.

 _Believing something is your duty doesn’t automatically give you the right to do it, Matt. They’re_ dead _. You_ killed _them._

What’s black and white and red all over?

“Temple!”

She’d finished with her last patient all of twelve seconds ago. But Hell’s Kitchen did her the service of making sure she was never bored.

“Looks like he got hit in the head with a piece of rebar. Choked on his own vomit.”

Whether he lived or died, this man would not make the papers. Nor would the next she treated, or the next.

Somewhere in the city, strong-stanced on a rooftop with his shoulders set like a fighter about to enter the ring, the Devil of Hell’s Kitchen watched the world below and made his choice.

**Author's Note:**

> Title comes from [“Blunt Force Trauma” – Taking Berlin](https://soundcloud.com/taking-berlin/blunt-force-trauma?in=taking-berlin/sets/the-lottery)
> 
> Inspiration credit to [this post](http://robotmango.tumblr.com/post/142157485924/i-assume-that-like-all-of-nyc-is-in-on-a) by tumblr user [robotmango](http://robotmango.tumblr.com/) ([orange_crushed](http://archiveofourown.org/users/orange_crushed/pseuds/orange_crushed))


End file.
